


As Above, So Below

by Kayka



Category: Labyrinth (1986)
Genre: ? - Freeform, Adventure, Eventual Romance, F/M, Frenemies, Gen, Humor, Inktober, Maybe more - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-01
Updated: 2018-10-31
Packaged: 2019-07-23 07:02:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 31
Words: 3,100
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16154018
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kayka/pseuds/Kayka
Summary: Dr. Sarah Williams grew up to lead a mundane, magic-free life. That is, until one day, when her lab exploded. A short series consisting of perfect 100 word drabbles. COMPLETE.





	1. Poisonous

**Author's Note:**

> Should I start something new when I have plenty of other things I need to finish? Probably not. But the mood struck me, and I haven't written anything for fun in what feels like ages. This is a little series that will be using Inktober prompts, since I've already done a Labyrinth themed Inktober before. Each chapter will be exactly 100 words and updated daily through October.

The plague began with a tiny drop of blood, nothing more. One diseased fairy soon became a hundred. Even with worthless Hogwart's extermination rounds, sickness spread throughout his kingdom without Jareth seeing the threat until far too late.

Twelve long years passed before he traced the cause to the human girl that had dared to defy him and her terribly annoying habit of not keeping her toxic blood to herself.

Jareth merely hoped he could find the nitwit and convince her to return to clean up her mess. She'd always been a dreamer; all he needed to do was listen.


	2. Tranquil

Sarah pulled at her hair in frustration; the experiment wasn't working. She didn't understand why. She'd followed the protocols, and it had worked perfectly yesterday  _on the first try_. Six snails subjects and twelve failed attempts later, it appeared the technique wasn't going to happen.

"It's your lucky day guys," She spoke to the aquarium and its inhabitants as she passed, "I have class to teach in an hour, anyway."

At fifteen, if anyone had told dreamy, dramatic Sarah she'd be jabbing electrodes into snail brains and teaching whiny freshmen introductory biology for a living, she wouldn't have believed them.

 


	3. Roasted

The piercing siren of the fire alarm cut through Sarah's lecture. It wasn't a drill; they'd had one only the week before.

"Okay, guys, let's get to the designated meeting spot. It's probably just the chemistry lab again. Nothing to worry about."

She held the door as her students filed out, single file. There was smoke in the hallway that appeared to be coming from the direction of...  _her_  lab!

Sarah thrust her clipboard toward the nearest student. "Corey, take this will you? Make sure everyone is accounted for."

She  _refused_  to lose five years worth of painstakingly collected data.


	4. Spell

 

When she got there, the door was hot to the touch, and her lab was definitely the origin of the fire.

 

"Damnit!"

 

She didn't understand; hers was not the sort of lab that stored anything that should spontaneously combust. 

 

The door was locked, so she fumbled for her keys. Sarah froze when she heard weak coughing from the other side.

 

It suddenly became clear that some dumb kid had broken in to smoke and subsequently set her life's work on fire. 

 

She banged her fist against the barrier. 

 

"Idiot! Just wait until I get in there! You little- _Goblin King_?!"


	5. Chicken

Sarah spent several precious seconds gawking at the prone figure, her rage evaporating. Before she could decide to run from the oddity of the situation, she found herself being moved bodily toward the exit.

Sarah dug in her heels. "But there's!"

"We've got him," the fireman assured her.

Sure enough, the Goblin King was draped over the shoulder of another fireman who was angling toward a stretcher.

She couldn't let Jareth get taken away by ambulance alone. Who knew what havoc he could wreak!

"Wait! He's my... boyfriend!" She dazedly heard herself shouting. "He came to surprise me for... Halloween?"

 


	6. Drooling

Sarah jerked awake, hoping she hadn't drooled all over herself during the few moments she'd fallen asleep. She'd spent the past several nights up too late with her research, but sleep couldn't be at the top of her priority list with the figment of her childhood imagination two feet away with a tube for oxygen shoved down his throat.

They'd just taken his blood, and Sarah knew it was only a matter of time before...

"Gah! I wish you'd get better and wake up to help me figure a way out of this mess before  _you_  become the science experiment!"


	7. Exhausted

Jareth became suddenly and acutely aware of the feelings and sensations associated with the curious human phrase, "I feel like I've been hit by a bus." 

 

It was a moment later he realized that he uttered these words, or rather, attempted to around a human device that sought to choke him from the inside. He may have panicked the tiniest bit.

 

"You're awake! Hold on, I'll get a nurse. I don't know how to take it out." 

 

Ah. Sarah Williams, his continued bane. Perhaps the spell that brought him through the divide had not failed quite so spectacularly, after all.


	8. Star

The recent surge of sparkling magic still glittered around the woman, and he was certain the little fool had no idea what she had just done. If she had been wandering around unchecked all this time...

Jareth let his eyes drift closed, but his respite was short. The promised nurse arrived to remove the infernal torture device. Sarah Williams had allowed him to be taken to a  _human_  hospital.

Jareth stopped time when the nurse began to ask questions for which he had no mortal answer.

"That will not hold long. The magic is too thin here. Let us depart."


	9. Precious

The pair walked out into a bustling hallway. 

 

"My reach is limited in this realm," the Goblin King sniffed, dismissively.

 

Sarah rolled her eyes. He'd already spent time they apparently did not have wrestling into his shirt. Luckily, the staff put off trying to peel- or cut- him out of his breeches. 

 

No one stopped them, even though Jareth was still yanking off electrodes and pulling out the i.v. She failed to notice when the king stopped abruptly, and Sarah crashed into him.

 

His voice was oddly high and oddly tight. 

 

"Sarah, did you allow them to steal my blood?" 


	10. Flowing

"Where are you going?! We have to get out of here! They'll be looking for you!"

"They won't find me," The king huffed.

The stream of people gave them a wide berth, but oddly, no one seemed to  _look_  at them. With a 'do straight out of an eighty's hair band, Jareth should be garnering  _some_  attention, nearly Halloween or no.

"But shouldn't-"

"That blood  _cannot_  be left behind. It does not  _belong_  here."

Sarah groaned, wondering why she was still following the crazy, fairy-tale king, now that he was awake and ambulatory.

"How can we possibly find it?"

"Magic."


	11. Cruel

Right.

 

Magic.

 

She'd stopped believing in magic after her friends stopped appearing in her mirror. 

 

"Okay. I'm very glad you're not dead and all, but this is insane. I already haven't slept in two days, and I need to go and see if anything can be salvaged from the five years worth of research you just destroyed."

 

Jareth spun around, looking more the terrifying, intimidating Goblin King from her memory than he had at any point, thus far.

 

"Funny, that you should mention destruction when it is you who unwittingly destroyed my entire world. We are not nearly even, Sarah."

 


	12. Whale

* * *

Well, that was a huge... something. Did that mean Hoggle, Ludo, and Sir Didymus were-

" _Me_ \- How?"

"You brought a  _plague_  upon my lands with your carelessness. Did you not ever  _wonder_  why the visits stopped?" He prodded.

"I just thought I was a little bit crazy, with an overactive imagination. It's why I started studying psychology and neuroscience. I wanted to know why my brain would..." She trailed off at the look of disgust and disdain on his face. "Anyway. Not important. Let's get your blood, so you can go."

And so that she could break down somewhere private.


	13. Guarded

Sarah eyed the doors to the phlebotomy lab, trying to look inconspicuous. She knew that whatever magic Jareth had going on prevented people from noticing him, but she wasn't so sure it extended to herself.

 

"You know where it is, now. Can't you just summon it, or something?" Sarah asked.

 

"The blood was taken from me," the King derided. "I cannot summon that which I do not possess."

 

"So?"

 

"You shall retrieve it." 

 

"What?! That's not fair!" Sarah squawked. "How will I even know what-"

 

His gloved hand took hers, and the cold weight of a crystal manifested.

 

"You'll know."


	14. Clock

Sarah's heart thumped an impressively rapid tattoo the closer she got to the lab doors. Of all the things she had been through in the past few hours, she didn't know why a little theft of a vial of blood panicked her the most. She gripped the crystal tighter, ignoring its useless, cold thrum that seemed to beat in time with her own heart.

Once inside, Sarah wondered how she was going to find the correct vial when she saw the one with an unmistakably golden glow.

She eyed the crystal in her hand. "Maybe not so useless after all."


	15. Weak

 

Sarah handed over the vial of blood that disappeared into a bag with the rest of Jareth's impromptu collection of medical waste.

 

"Now, can we get out of here?"

 

"Of course."

 

Before she could protest, the king grabbed her hand that still clutched the crystal. The ball tumbled to the ground and shattered, causing the world to disappear in a glittery haze.

 

Sarah found herself weakly clambering up off the floor of her own living room. 

 

"How did we get here?"

 

"Magic is driven by will and intent. Beyond all else, you wished to return home."

 

"I brought us here?"


	16. Angular

The glimmer of the illusion she'd spun for them faltered only momentarily. Jareth wisely did not mention it.

"Indeed."

He examined the woman whose dreams he could once enumerate.

He'd spent weeks searching for her and nearly missed finding her completely because Sarah deviated wildly from his expectations.

When his spell ripped the barrier to transport him to the place she cherished most, Jareth initially thought he'd stumbled upon the wrong human.

It occurred to him that he had no idea how to entice this relative stranger that spent her days dissecting mollusks to do what needed to be done.


	17. Swollen

"I don't believe in magic." Sarah burst out, unable to withstand the growing tension any longer.

After a brief pause, the Goblin King chortled at her pronouncement. There was no other description for the sound.

"You  _cannot_  be serious." He said, sardonically, once he regained his breath.

Sarah's lips thinned.

"I am serious. Magic may exist. I may have gone on a crazy adventure back when I was fifteen. But I don't have to believe in it. And I don't. Not anymore."

The infuriating laughter resumed.

" How delightfully ironic. Miss Williams, you  _do_  manage to keep things interesting. "


	18. Bottle

"Okay, have your little joke at my expense. Whatever. I just wanted to head you off at the pass because you're here, and you wouldn't be unless it had something to do with magic. But I don't believe in it, so, I can't help you. " Sarah huffed at the end of her tirade.

" A magical creature that professes not to believe in magic is not what I expected to find. However, you are correct in that my visit has purpose. I do have a request. But first..."

A crystal appeared with a flourish of his hand.

"A gift."


	19. Scorched

The gravity defying ball floated lazily in her direction.

"Thanks, but no thanks, Goblin King."

"Must you  _insist_  on being so tiresomely infuriating?"

The ball accentuated his point by rapping her twice on the forehead. So much for refusing to touch the damned thing.

"It is a gift freely given. You shall be under no obligation to fulfill my request."

"I'm a bit old for a crystal full of dreams."

Jareth smiled.

His crystal pinged her on the head once more before shattering, engulfing her.

The scorched remains of Sarah's lab stood before her. Then, the fire caught... in reverse.


	20. Breakable

Sarah watched as time flowed backward and the lab righted itself. She caught sight of the cause, Jareth  _un_ bursting through a rip in reality.

The scene popped and disintegrated, leaving her back in her living room.

"You shall find your... sanctuary in top condition upon your next visit."

"That was nice of you. I guess." Sarah acknowledged tentatively, even to her own ears sounding like the petulant teen she once was.

"I didn't mean to sound that way. Sorry... I just." Sarah frustratedly mussed her own hair, "Let's get this over with. What is it you need from me?"

"Everything."


	21. Drain

Sarah rolled her eyes. Of course the Goblin King wouldn't ask for  _much._

"This is my unimpressed face. Try again," she deadpanned.

"I need you to restore balance to the Underground."

What could  _she_  do? He'd suggested that she was somehow magical and that she destroyed his world, but she wasn't special. She was just Sarah.

"Not clearing things up much, Goblin King."

"There is much to explain, but it would be far more expedient to  _show_  you."

"I'm not going back to the Labyrinth with you."

The king's lips quirked momentarily, but his expression remained tight.

"We're already here."


	22. Expensive

"You dragged me here when you supposedly ' _fixed_ ' my lab, didn't you!? You good for nothing rat-"

Sarah's voice fell silent even though she still shouted at the top of her lungs.

"Please allow me to explain first, and I will allow you to harangue me at your leisure."

Having little other choice Sarah gestured for him to get on with it.

"Magic is driven by will and intent. You wished to return home.  _As did I_. Your magic, my crystal, and voila," the King gestured vaguely around them before focusing on the curious landscape beyond the window. "A compromise."


	23. Muddy

"Compromise this!"

Sarah Williams could not precisely say _how_  the Goblin King ended up face down in the dirt outside her quote-unquote  _house._

Nor could she quite put her finger on which transgression finally caused her to snap.

The only thing she knew for sure was that she wished the wall wasn't in the way, and suddenly it wasn't. Boom. Jareth. Dirt.

"Are you quite finished, or must I allow you to abuse me further?" The Goblin King asked, spitting out withered grass; the most undignified she had ever seen him, including at the hospital.

She found it oddly... charming.


	24. Chop

In that moment, Sarah realized two things.

One, she was in deep, deep trouble if she started finding their squabbling fun.

Two, and more pressingly, Jareth hadn't exaggerated; the Labyrinth was in shambles.

Sections floated listlessly, some areas were completely gone, and most markedly different from the last time she had been underground when it was full of life, seeming like eyes watched her at all times, she now felt none, and saw no one.

"I did this?"

"You were the catalyst, yes."

She may have decided not to believe in magic, but Sarah was never one to shirk responsibility.


	25. Prickly

"I'll help fix it," Sarah declared, "but how could I have possibly caused this?"

"A drop of blood, and an unfortunate fairy. Your plague progressed slowly. I failed to notice, failed to find the cause, until far too late."

Sarah searched her memory.

"The only fairies I saw were at the entrance when I first got here. Hoggle was exterminating them, anyway." The hair at the nape of her neck prickled. "And one bit me."

"You are not the first mortal to bleed Underground, but you  _were_  the first and only to change the rules and seize your own power."


	26. Stretch

_Oh_ , Sarah  _so_  was not liking the sound of this.

"In doing so, you inadvertently bound this land to your will."

Nope.  _Really_  not liking it.

Jareth's eyes cut to her.

"You've been leaking magic Above all this time, and in turn, you brought mortality to the Below."

"But that can't be right. Like I just said, Hoggle was killing fairies when I got here."

"Encouraging a brief stasis is hardly the same as your plague. Now, what is dead is gone."

Sarah blanched.

"If it's too late to save anyone, what am I even doing here?"

"Creating something new."


	27. Thunder

The earth rumbled, cracking beneath her feet as the rain fell in an unrelenting torrent. Sarah stumbled, but Jareth grabbed her arm, dragging her along.

The hair on Sarah's arm raised, and she jerked back, pulling the Goblin King along by the hand that still held her. Lightning crashed scant feet in front of them, but the sonorous roar that had been tailing them sounded much further away.

She spotted a newly born cave, and headed for the relative safety it promised.

"You're really not very good at this."

"Give me a break," Sarah huffed, winded, "It's my first day."


	28. Gift

"I'm not supposed to be back for another four hours, and I've finally got a decent cell to record. This had better be important."

Jareth shot her one of those infuriatingly smug looks that had started driving her crazy weeks ago with his abrupt, initial appearance.

"I spotted something in my flight of the perimeter."

Sarah glanced to the chart recorder. It should continue recording with or without her hovering.

"Okay. Fine."

He swept them Below to a verdant copse and a _fox's_ den. A _bipedal_ fox, at that.

Sarah's breath caught, hopeful.

"Is that? Will that be Sir Didymus?"


	29. Double

Sarah was pooped. With her days spent at the university, her remaining waking  _and_  sleeping hours spent Underground learning, dreaming, and creating, she found herself tired. A lot.

Sarah stumbled into the perfect replica of her home, a thankfully sturdy construction  _not_  consisting of junk.

"Scrabble?" A courtly voice queried.

"I hate that one. Chinese checkers!"

"Wuaagh!"

She wasn't certain how, but she was sure she had Jareth to thank for her friends' return.

"Not tonight, fellows, I believe I was promised a game of three-dimensional chess."

The same Jareth who had apparently commandeered her settee.

_One game wouldn't hurt._


	30. Jolt

Before Sarah realized it, six months had passed.

"What am I doing here, Jareth?" She asked one day. "The Underground is flourishing, you have subjects again, and as long as I don't constantly leak magic Above, everything here should remain stable. We haven't even been at each other's throats for the past two weeks. Face it, you don't need me anymore."

She sighed.

"It's not that I  _want_  to go, but I can't keep bouncing back and forth Above and Below forever."

"I see." Jareth cocked his head appraisingly, "In that case-"

Sarah startled awake in her own bedroom.

Above.


	31. Slice

 

Jareth waited twelve minutes and fifty-four seconds for Sarah Williams to storm back Below. 

 

"I see that you have come to the conclusion that you are needed."

 

"If you'd let me finish, you would know that I was only trying to figure out if I should consider eventually making arrangements... one way or the other."

 

Sarah paused, spotting the confection. 

 

"Is that... a piece... of cake?"

 

"Why, yes. I wished to see how you enjoyed this little-"

 

The slice smashed into his face. Jareth grinned. 

 

He needed only entice her to remain, and his world would never be boring again.

 

The End

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was only ever intended to be a little thing consisting of snippets in time. So, this is all, for now.


End file.
